THE PROGRESSIVE CONSERVATIVE, USA
An Online Journal of Political Commentary & Analysis
Volume XI, Issue # 181, August 28, 2009
Dr. Almon Leroy Way, Jr., Editor
Government Committed to & Acting in Accord with Conservative Principles
Ensures a Nation's Strength, Progress, & Prosperity
TARIQ RAMADAN REPUDIATED
By Stephen Schwartz
THE ISLAMIST FIFTH COLUMN THAT IS BEING ALLOWED TO OPERATE WITHIN AMERICAN & BRITISH BORDERS:
THE NEED TO PREVENT ISLAMIST ENEMIES OF THE WEST FROM ENTERNIG BRITAIN & THE U.S.A. -- THE NEED TO PREVENT
U.S. PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA'S OUTREACH TO MUSLIM EXTREMISTS FROM UNDERMINING THE SECURITY OF AMERICA
& ITS ALLIES -- DUTCH ACTION AGAINST AN ISLAMIST HOLDING & MISUSING ACADEMIC POSTS IN THE NETHERLANDS
FULL STORY:
In an important development for the fight against extremist Islam in the West, the Dutch City of Rotterdam and
Erasmus University in Rotterdam have dismissed Tariq Ramadan, the Swiss-born Islamist academic, from his two
local jobs.
Born in Switzerland, Ramadan is the grandson of Hassan al-Banna, Founder of the radical Muslim Brotherhood. He is
a close associate of the fundamentalist Muslim theologian Yusuf al-Qaradawi, with whom he collaborates in the
socalled European Council for Fatwas and Research [ECFR], a Brotherhood-oriented body. Al-Qaradawi is the
leading theorist of a "European Islam" that would abuse Western standards of religious freedom by erecting a
parallel system of Shariah law alongside established civil law, coupled with aggressive da'wa, or Islamic proselytizing.
Ramadan has endorsed this strategy. The ECFR scheme, and Tariq Ramadan's involvement in it, are documented in
the recent Center for Islamic Pluralism report, A Guide to Shariah Law and Islamist Ideology in Western Europe,
2007-2009.
Ramadan has been barred from entry into the U.S.A. since 2004, when he was invited by the University of Notre
Dame to become the Henry R. Luce Professor at the Kroc Institute for International Peace Studies. That ruling was
based on Ramadan's financial contributions to two Palestinian groups designated by the U.S. Treasury as
fundraising agencies for the terrorists of Hamas. Early in July of this year, however, given the new atmosphere of
outreach to Muslim radicals under President Barack Obama, the Second Circuit U.S. Appeals Court reversed the
lower-court ruling, effectively nullifying the prohibition on an American visa for Ramadan.
Meanwhile, Britain, in 2005, allowed Ramadan to take up a position at Oxford University, where he is the His
Highness Hamad Bin Khalifa Al-Thani Chair in Contemporary Islamic Studies.
Ramadan is an indefatigable self-promoter. Few who have observed him paid attention to his work in the
Netherlands as an integration adviser for the city of Rotterdam and a professor of "Citizenship and Identity" at
Erasmus University.
Yet, while the U.S. authorities now seem inclined to allow him on our shores, and Britain appears untroubled by his
presence -- although the UK bars his associate al-Qaradawi -- the Dutch have taken action to curb Ramadan's
ambitions.
His simultaneous dismissal from the Rotterdam City post and the Erasmus appointment was announced on August
19, 2009. The specific reason: his weekly television program on PressTV, an Iranian government media
network which operates studios in Britain and the U.S.A., in addition, of course, to the Middle East. PressTV
also employs British politician George Galloway of the Leftist-Islamist electoral alliance known as the Respect Party,
and Yvonne Ridley, a former captive of the Taliban, who became Muslim after her kidnapping.
Ramadan's PressTV show was titled "Islam and Life" -- not very different, one might note, from the notorious
"Shariah and Life" feature run by al-Qaradawi on Al-Jazeera. Al-Qaradawi has used that platform for
outrageous sermons against Jews and Judaism, among other objectionable opinions that support the British
decision to keep him out.
In an official statement, Erasmus University stated:
"The Municipality of Rotterdam and the Erasmus
University Rotterdam (EUR) have decided to
terminate the appointment of Dr. Tariq Ramadan. . . .
The reason for this is his involvement in the
Iranian television channel PressTV, which is
considered to be irreconcilable with his
positions in Rotterdam. . . .
"Press TV is a channel financed by the Iranian
government. The excessive force used by this
government in June against demonstrators, many
of whom were students, prompted a number of
journalists to cut their ties with the channel.
However, Tariq Ramadan chose not to do so, and
has since justified his decision in a statement. . . .
[T]here is no longer the essential public support
for the contribution to the City and the University
and . . . the credibility of Dr. Ramadan's continued
work for the City and the University has suffered
lasting damage."
Tariq Ramadan has always been extremely capable in his manipulation of Western public opinion, but the
problematical items on his CV are not limited to his link with PressTV. As if his association with Al-Qaradawi
were insufficient, Ramadan was also criticized in France in 2003 when he published a Jew-baiting attack on several
leading French intellectuals, including Bernard-Henri Lévy and André Glucksmann. Ramadan claimed it was
"curious" that that these two individuals were the most important Western European defenders of the Bosnian
Muslims during the Balkan Wars of the 1990s, as well as of the human rights of the Chechens, but also supported
the U.S. intervention in Iraq. According to Ramadan, the removal of Saddam Hussein was intended to guarantee "
a greater security for Israel with assured economic advantages."
In the same article, Ramadan falsely alleged that Israeli military advisers participated in the Iraq war, and labeled
Paul Wolfowitz the "notorious Zionist" allegedly responsible for the invasion of Iraq in the interest of Israel. He
accused Lévy and Glucksmann of abandoning universal principles and acting "as Jews, or nationalists, as
defenders of Israel." Publication of this screed was refused by the Parisian dailies Le Monde and
Libération, but it was eventually posted on an Islamist website, http://www.oumma.com/.
Tariq Ramadan hides his extremist views in plain sight. Why do the British and now, unfortunately, the American
authorities fail to comprehend the evidence in front of them? The U.S. ban on him should be reviewed again, and
upheld.
LINKS TO RELATED TOPICS:
Islamism & Jihadism -- The Threat of Radical Islam
Page Three
Page Two
Page One
Lawfare -- The Use of Law as a Weapon in War & Politics:
Islamist Lawfare & the "Legal" Jihad Against America & the West
Middle East -- Arabs, Arab States,
& Their Middle Eastern Neighbors
American Foreign Policy -- The Middle East
International Politics & World Disorder:
War, Peace, & Geopolitics in the Real World:
Foreign Affairs & U.S. National Security
Page Two
Page One
Islamist Terrorist Attacks on the U.S.A.
Osama bin Laden & the Islamist Declaration of War
Against the U.S.A. & Western Civilization
Islamist International Terrorism &
U.S. Intelligence Agencies
Counterterrorism & U.S. National Security
U.S. National Security Strategy
Stephen Schwartz is Executive Director of the Center for Islamic Pluralism. This article was sponsored by Campus
Watch, a project of the Middle East Forum .
The foregoing article by Stephen Schwartz was originally published in the American Thinker, August 28, 2009,
and
can be found on the Internet website maintained by the Middle East Forum, a foreign policy think tank which seeks to
define and promote American interests in the Middle East, defining U.S. interests to include fighting radical Islam,
working for Palestinian Arab acceptance of the State of Israel, improving the management of U.S. efforts to promote
constitutional democracy in the Middle East, reducing America's energy dependence on the Middle East, more robustly
asserting U.S. interests vis-à-vis Saudi Arabia, and countering the Iranian threat.
(Article URL: http://www.meforum.org/article/2445/ tariq-ramadan-repudiated)
Republished with Permission of the Middle East Forum
Reprinted from the Middle East Forum News
mefnews@meforum.org (MEF NEWS)
August 28, 2009
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Dr. Almon Leroy Way, Jr., Editor
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